As wireless devices become more prevalent, users continually demand more functions and capabilities from these devices. More recently, wireless devices are increasingly available with broadband internet connectivity. This availability opens new opportunities for users of such wireless devices. For example, in emerging markets around the world, users may not have access to personal computers with broadband internet connections, or may not wish to pay for general packet radio service (GPRS) connections. Instead, these users may opt to receive digital content via, for example, Bluetooth connections established between phones.
To pair two phones using conventional Bluetooth approaches, the users would typically put their respective phones into a discovery mode and locate the phones in proximity to one another. The users would then exchange pass codes, and enter the pass codes into the phones.
While adequate for their intended uses, these conventional approaches suffer drawbacks, chiefly the manual steps taken by the respective users in obtaining and entering the pass codes. Accordingly, automated approaches have been proposed, in which the devices automatically pair themselves with any devices in close enough proximity. While an improvement over manual approaches, these automated approaches may expose users and devices to viruses and other forms of malware. More specifically, these automated approaches may not authenticate the devices with which they are pairing. In this sense, the connections between the paired devices are not secured, and any malicious content stored on one paired device may readily migrate to another paired device over this unsecured connection.